There is a story by Graham Greene called The Heart of the Matter. It takes place during the Second World War in an unnamed British colony in Africa. Greene does a very effective job of showing what a difficult cultural experience it was for everyone involved. Those who felt the oppression of British rule, of course, but also the peculiar discomforts of the British working in this foreign land. There was much talk about the weather – far too hot and humid and sunny for the English, except during the rainy season, six months when they all fear they may drown. There was the malaria, which seemed to be an inevitability for anyone who was there long enough, and apparently no treatment for it except quinine. So, lots of gin and tonics. And there was the overwhelming level of distrust – which went in every direction, and this is where we see the real problem.
The distrust, the constant tendency to be suspicious of others’ motives, the lack of understanding, and the resentment that every group seemed to have for the others, all contributed to a sort of sinister atmosphere.
One of these British officers is named Scobie. He has been there 15 years, an unusually long time and, consequently, the other Englishmen regard him as suspect. Because they wonder how anyone could have survived in this place for so long. They know how hard it is. They know that many men have come and gone, corrupted by their experiences to a greater or lesser degree. And so they are very interested in, and suspicious of, Scobie. They spread rumors about him and all the corrupt things they imagine he has done. Yet Scobie is so disciplined he never allows himself to react to the rumors in the smallest way.
It seems that Scobie has managed to survive because of his discipline. He knows where the fault lines are, and he is always conscious of steering clear of them. He goes to the officer’s club in the early evening but refuses a drink because he will be on duty that night. He diligently reports every infraction of the rules, dotting every I and crossing every T. In fact, Scobie is even careful when he writes to his wife, lest he put down anything on paper that would be, even in the smallest sense, a lie. He would simply be unable to sign his name to a written document that contained any untruth.
If he errs it is on the side of omission. Every interaction of his life is handled as though he were under oath on the witness stand.
But one day he does something unusual. In a certain way it is wholly consistent with his character. Yet, in another way and at the same time, it is completely out of character for Scobie. He has a moment of sympathy for a man who broke a rule for what seemed to be a good reason. Rather than submit an honest report about a rules infraction, Scobie hides it.
He doesn’t do it for a bribe – even though he was offered one, he refused it. He only does it because it feels like the humane thing to do. But, after he does this, a strange thing unfolds.
It is as though this one action has punctured a hole in Scobie’s moral cloak. And he is no longer able to guard himself from the evil in the atmosphere, the opportunities for sin that always hover around him. One small act leads to another slightly larger act, then another even larger act. And Scobie is drowning.
It is as though he has lost his moral compass, because Scobie’s compass was only upheld by a perfect submission to the rules. Unfortunately for Scobie, it is not in the nature of humans to be perfect.
Presbyterians have no illusions about that. We are aware that our nature is fallible, that there is a weakness built into us that makes us liable to do the wrong we would try to avoid, and to fail to do the things we know we ought to do. It is not for nothing that we confess our sinfulness when we gather together each Sunday. We stand in need of God’s forgiveness. Every day.
Given that, the words we hear Jesus say in this part of his sermon to his disciples and the crowds listening to him seem incredible.
You thought it was hard when he called you salt. Now he calls you to tear out your eye. You were surprised when he said he had not come to abolish the law and its hold over us but rather to fulfill the law. Now he seems to be showing just how hard it might be.
If you are angry, you will be liable to judgment. If you insult someone you will be liable to the fires of hell. Jesus takes the laws they already know and raises the stakes to the nth degree.
And that seems to be what Scobie is doing also. He has created a ten-foot fence around the faults he might be liable to commit. He strives to live a perfectly upright life in every way.
He fails.
It takes a rather long time, but he eventually fails. And when he does, he has not a compass, an anchor, nor a lifeboat. He is utterly adrift at sea, and will, without doubt, drown.
It doesn’t work. It simply never works when you aim for faultlessness.
Scobie holds his failure close. It is indelibly marked in his memory as the day he lost his integrity. Once he had crossed over the line, that ten-foot fence he had created, he just didn’t know anymore where the boundary lines were.
The story of Scobie is a tragedy, because he is a good man. The reader sympathizes with him as we watch him falter and falter again. We watch him grow more confused about everything around him. He goes to his monthly confession and he says to the priest, “All through this month I have done the minimum.” In a moment of insight he says, “I don’t know how to put it, Father, but I feel – tired of my religion. It seems to mean nothing to me.” Yet the priest finds no real fault in him and seems to have nothing much to offer. He assigns him his Hail Marys and Our Fathers and dismisses him.
Scobie is a man who has always tried to avoid doing wrong. His downfall, perhaps, is that he has not thought enough about doing right. He has not paid attention to the heart of the matter.
And the heart of the matter is that we are created in the image of a loving God. For Christians, Jesus is our model for what it means to be made in God’s image. The heart of the matter is that in Christ we receive forgiveness for our trespasses, yes, but also the Spirit that allows us to grow in grace.
This is what Jesus wants us to see: To avoid the wrong is the bare minimum. To seek the good is to live into our identity as the image of God.
This is the heart of the matter:
To accept God’s forgiveness for our wrongs yet to strive anew for the good.
To know ourselves as humble and frail creatures yet to seek to be like Christ.
To turn, once again, from sin and to center ourselves in God’s love.
In the words of Moses: God sets before us blessings and curses, life and death. “Choose life,” he says. Choose life.
It is a choice that we all have. When we keep our focus on the edges, the boundary lines, we are keeping our focus on sin, failure, death. But when we look to Jesus, his words and actions, we see all the possibility there is for us. We see the possibility of life in all its fullness.
When all is said and done, that is the heart of the matter.
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Photo by Nedelcu Catalin: https://www.pexels.com/photo/hand-drawing
